Guatemala ex-leader Rios Montt’s genocide conviction overturned

Guatemala's highest court has overturned a genocide conviction against former dictator Efrain Rios Montt and reset his trial back to when a dispute broke out a month ago over who should hear the case.

Rios Montt (86) was found guilty on May 10th of overseeing the killings by the armed forces of at least 1,771 members of the Maya Ixil population during his 1982-83 rule. He was sentenced to 80 years in prison.

However, in a ruling yesterday, the country’s constitutional court ordered that all the proceedings be voided going back to April 19th, when one of the presiding judges suspended the trial because of a dispute with another judge over who should hear it. It was unclear when the trial might restart.

Rios Montt’s conviction was hailed as a landmark for justice in the Central American nation, where as many as 250,000 people were killed in a bloody civil war lasting from 1960 to 1996.

When Rios Montt was in power, his government launched a fierce offensive in which soldiers raped, tortured and killed tens of thousands of Maya villagers suspected of helping Marxist rebels.

Thousands more were forced into exile or had to join paramilitary forces fighting the insurgents.

After he was sentenced, a court ordered the government to apologize for atrocities committed against indigenous people.

Ana Caba, an ethnic Ixil who survived the civil war after fleeing her home, was stunned by the court's decision. "I'm distressed," she said. "I don't know what's happening. That's how this country is. The powerful people do what they want and we poor and indigenous are devalued. We don't get justice. Justice means nothing for us."